DS9 News & Stories: Founders of the Dominion

Site: http://lcars.frontierfleet.net/core/Founders

Quadrant: Gamma Quadrant

Physiology:

The Female Founder

In their natural form, the Founders exist as a gelatinous liquid and can unite is what is described as the Great Link which they can leave and reform into any any shape whenever possible.

Their ability to shapeshift is so complete that a founder in the guise of another species is virtually undetectable even with scanning equipment. However, should a piece of the Founder’s body be separated from the main body mass, the separated piece reverts to a gelatinous state. The Founders also revert to a gelatinous state upon death.

Starfleet phasers set to a force of 3.5 are sufficient to force a Founder to revert to a gelatinous state.

Dr. Ethan Locken theorized that the Founders were once solids, but their current state was achieved through the same genetic engineering used to create the Jem’Hadar and the Vorta.

History:

The Founder’s Gelatinous State

The Founders created the Dominion. Some Dominion subjects believe they are a myth. The Founder’s homeworld is a sunless Class-M planet located in the Omarion Nebula.

Long ago, the Founders explored the galaxy, but were persecuted by non-shapeshifters. This persecution fueled their all-powerful drive to control the chaos around them. Beginning some 2,000 years ago, they sought to maintain order out of this chaos with a rule based on strict obedience, enforced by the Jem’Hadar troops they genetically bred into chemical addiction for control, and administered by the cloned Vorta both of whom worship the Founders as gods.

The Founders did not lose their curiosity about the universe. They sent a hundred infant members of their race across the galaxy, implanting in each a powerful desire to return home, so that the Founders could learn of distant places. Odo was one of these infants.

Odo & The Female Founder linking

Until Odo’s torn loyalties led him to defend the U.S.S Defiant by accidentally killing a Changeling spy in 2371, no Founder had ever harmed another due to their strong link with all other members of their species.

In 2371, the Romulan Tal Shiar and Cardassian Obsidian Order launched a massive attack against the Founder’s Homeworld, bombarding the planet with a fleet of 20 starships. The Founders had learned of the plan, and staged an ambush, by evacuating the planet, and placing a fleet of 150 Jem’Hadar ships nearby to destroy the invading fleet. Both organizations were decimated by the Jem’Hadar.

The Founders also tried to initiate a war between the Federation and the Tzenkethi.

Sometime before 2373, the Founders replaced Klingon General Martok in hopes the Dominion could gain control over the Klingon Empire. The Founders then led Odo to believe that Gowron, not Martok, had been replaced by a changeling. However, the truth was discovered, and the original Martok was eventually rescued.

In 2373, The Founders entered into an alliance with the Cardassian Union, giving the Dominion a significant foothold in the Alpha Quadrant. The agreement resulted in a reinstatement of the Khitomer Accords.

Cardassians, members of the Dominion

New Info:

Founders have to return to their natural state every 18 hours to regenerate. (DS9: A Man Alone)

Founders do not eat. (DS9: The Forsaken)

Contributed by: Clare Bradley

DS9 Stories/News: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Crossroads of Time (Genesis/Mega Drive) (1)

When I found out that this was actually released for real I had to check it out. A Star Trek platformer? Seriously?

Apparently the lead designer wrote a Star Trek fan film, so I expect this is going to be fairly faithful to the franchise. The music sounds like the actual Deep Space Nine theme, and that looks like the right space station, so it’s doing well so far.

Some Trek games (like Starfleet Academy and Elite Force for example) put the player in the shoes of Lieutenant Bland, chiselled generic space hero, who gets to go on an adventure alongside everyone’s favourite heroes from the show.

But fuck that, I’m Commander Benjamin Sisko himself, and this is my office.

Dammit Odd, how many times have I told you not to call here and interrupt my kung fu? Odo, whatever.

Eventually I realise he’s not going to stop calling me, so I should probably go find ‘security’ and hear what he has to say. First step: leave office.

These graphics aren’t actually that bad at all, and Sisko moves fairly… gracefully. Okay, the faces are a little weird, but that’s what happens when you go for realism at this kind of resolution.

The music on the other hand, is nothing like the soundtrack to the series. For one thing it’s catchy and tuneful. Exactly what I want to be listening to when I’m playing my ridiculous Star Trek platformer. Okay, now where the hell is the way out of this place?

Damn, you can really tell these two are related.

This corridors looks like it’s supposed to be in a complete loop, but sadly it doesn’t wrap around at the edges. Nice parallax scrolling though.

Okay, I’m just going to watch him do this for a second or two. There’s nothing even up there, it’s entirely pointless.

Right, what was I doing again? Oh yeah, I’m looking for ‘security’.

A docking pylon you say? I think I passed the door to that on the way here.

Uhuh. So… what now? He mentioned that Doctor Bashir was treating the technician so I suppose I should go find him.

Right, now that’s done I can go start the first level.

Doctor Bashir didn’t give me any clues about what I’m supposed to be doing now, so I suppose I’ll have to go talking to people until one of them gives me the next part of the plot.

LATER.

http://superadventuresingaming.blogspot.com/2011/12/star-trek-deep-space-nine-crossroads-of.html

DS9 Stories/News: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Leeta’s Love Life

Source: http://thehathorlegacy.com/star-trek-deep-space-nine-%E2%80%93-leeta%E2%80%99s-love-life/

by Revena on September 14, 2006

I want to continue with my series about the female characters of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (see the previous article, “Jadzia’s Gender,” here) without too much of a gap between articles, but, of course, I’ve been insanely busy for the last few weeks, and haven’t had any time to do the prep work for another article, much less write one.

So I’m gonna cheat a little bit, and write about Leeta (played by Chase Masterson). This is easy, because while I think Leeta is great (there are not many DS9 characters that I wouldn’t describe as great, really), she does get a lot less screen time than most of the other female characters, and what I want to say about her is comparatively easy to express. It goes a little something like this:

Leeta is sexy. She is played by a lovely actress, she is usually dressed in low-cut and/or tight-fitting costumes, and her job is linked to her sexuality – she’s a dabo girl at Quark’s. Leeta is also sexual. In her first appearance on the show (in the third season episode “Explorers”), she flirts quite openly with Dr. Julian Bashir, whom she later dates. The two eventually break up, without acrimony, on Risa, where Leeta is shown enjoying a sensual encounter with another man (“Let He Who is Without Sin”¦” in season five).

Sexuality isn’t the only thing Leeta’s got going for her – she has a strong sense of justice (she becomes quite involved in the formation of the Guild of Restaurant and Casino Employees), she is friendly and seems to have many platonic relationships, and though she can be a bit flighty, she’s no dummy.

But her sexual energy is definitely one of her most marked traits. And even though that’s the case, Leeta winds up with one of the happiest endings on the show by the end of the series. She hasn’t had any traumatic injuries, and her emotional trauma is no worse than that which affects any other character (Leeta loses friends to violence, but so does everyone else on DS9). She’s fallen in love, had that love returned, and gotten married. She gets along well with her new husband’s family. And, in the second-to-last episode of the series, that husband is named Grand Nagus of the Ferengi Alliance. Leeta gets love, health, and a husband who is politically powerful (and, presumably, a comfortable living as well).

How many other sexy, sexual female characters can you think of on television that end up so well? The sexy woman is usually the victim, or at least the recipient of some shaming or punishment from other characters on the show. She needs to be taught a lesson, made to pay, reformed, exposed as the slut she is – or else her sexiness needs to be linked somehow to a violent death or assault, in the constant sexualization of violence that we consumers and producers of Western media are so invested in.

There certainly are other female characters who are as flirty and as sensual as Leeta, and who wind up with happy endings anyway – but not many. As a person who doesn’t believe that there’s anything wrong with healthy expressions of adult sexuality, I’ll take all the Leetas on TV that I can get.

DS9 Stories/News: Some ‘Deep’ Talk with Alexander Siddig (3)

Cont.

Cairo Time

Jordan Hoffman: So let’s talk about the new movie Cairo Time, which I think is the first time you’ve played a romantic lead, is that correct?

Alexander Siddig: It is indeed, it is. Since I was at school, that’s the first time I’ve played a romantic.

Jordan Hoffman: How much fun is it to woo the hearts of audiences like that? To lay on the charm thick for the sake of the audience?

Alexander Siddig: It’s pretty great. It wasn’t so much, I have to confess I wasn’t really thinking of the audience when I was in Cairo but I – to gaze into that lady’s eyes [Patricia Clarkson] is quite thrilling.

Jordan Hoffman: Your character sort of welcomes this woman into the Egyptian culture and the city of Cairo; how much familiarity did you have with Cairo prior to making the film?

Alexander Siddig: Well, you know it’s one of the places that’s sort of been in my reference library all my life in the sense that I was born in the Sudan which is the neighboring country and up until – I mean forever we’ve had a treaty with Egypt and immigrants come and go; my whole family lived in Cairo for years. And so it was a familiar place and I’d been there in the 80’s as a kid really, so I knew my way around and I felt very comfortable and relaxed there. So it was easy to make the little leap from a Sudanese man to and Egyptian man which I had no problem doing.

Jordan Hoffman: So you didn’t have to think it too much.

Alexander Siddig: No, I really didn’t. It’s a really honest city for all its evils. It can be quite filthy – that’s not exactly an evil is it by world standards. But it lays itself out to you as a tourist. London for example, is an impossible city. You need to know people in London to find out where things are and what’s going on and you can’t make friends here unless you were kind of born here. So, Cairo is much more friendly and available to people.

Jordan Hoffman: So when you were shooting this film, it was a Canadian production, but it’s still a large western production and there isn’t too much of that on the streets of Cairo. How were you treated by the general population?

Alexander Siddig: They were completely puzzled by us. They were like, ‘what the Hell is that?’ they just couldn’t quite make out what weirdness we were doing. This was bigger than an ordinary video camera, we weren’t just saying hi in front of a landmark we were doing scenes, so when they could they would sort of jostle into the frame to get involved. Which was fine on some levels, but as soon as they started looking into the camera and stuff it was a total nightmare.

Jordan Hoffman: So that shot of nearly getting hit by a motorcycle, was that actual?

Alexander Siddig: We really did – well it was a stunt, but the interesting thing was that the stunt guy had never done a stunt in his life – was not a stunt man. He literally tried to run her over. And I must have buried my nails deep into her arm to get her out of the way she was absolutely – she was shaking afterwards. She wasn’t used to that.

Jordan Hoffman: Was it all Egyptian crew? Or was it Canadian crew?

Alexander Siddig: It was a beautiful mix actually. It was a whole jumble of different people. The Egyptians were brilliant, I mean really brilliant; and kind of cool and cosmopolitan and wanted to take us all out to cool places to hang out in the evenings. Egyptians – thank God you know Cairo is not a dry city and is not massively fundamentalist.  It’s got fundamentalist aspects, but you can still have a really swingin’ time.

Bashir and O’Brien

Jordan Hoffman: Who from the old days that you don’t get to see do you like to hang out with the most at conventions?

Alexander Siddig: You know I love hanging out with Nicky deBoer.

Jordan Hoffman: I see.

Alexander Siddig:  She is just hilarious; great, great girl. And um if I see Colm Meaney we’ll have a drink and bitch at each other. That’s all we do. I realize looking back at my history with him, I went out with him twice a week every week for seven years – drinking. Boy, he can pack em away.

Jordan Hoffman: I would imagine.

Alexander Siddig:  And all we did was fight. And I guess that’s what they did on the show too. But we fought in real life all the time. He would set me up, he’d take me to Irish bars where they hated English people. I would think they were being racist about the fact that I’m black and they weren’t. The just hated the English people, they would just hear my accent and they’d – and he just laughed his head off.

Jordan Hoffman: Did you ever actually play darts, though, is the real question.

Alexander Siddig:  No. No. That would be very weird.

Jordan Hoffman: There needs to be a separation between art and life.

Alexander Siddig:  Yes, because that was the only separation, the dart game.

DS9 Stories/News: Some ‘Deep’ Talk with Alexander Siddig (2)

Cont.

Reaction On The Station

Regarding his reaction to the character’s change.

Jordan Hoffman: What did the other cast members think? Were they on your side or did they think you were being crazy?

Alexander Siddig: I had a reputation for being a bit of a crank, yeah. They thought I was being cranky. I had this – there was one time I got furious because none of us were being paid royalties on our – this is rubbish, not important for the real world – but, nevertheless, we weren’t being paid royalties on our photographs. So I changed my name for a number of reasons, but that was one of them. So that they would have to re-do all the photographs, all the press with all the right name on it.

And I didn’t turn up to the big photo call for the season’s photo. So there’s one season’s photo of Deep Space Nine – the cast, without me in it which is the one I didn’t turn up to. And being a naïve twenty-something year-old, I didn’t realize that they immediately turned around and fired the head of marketing. So there was a real significant impact for me being such a childish brat.

Jordan Hoffman: Wow. So did that wake you up a little bit? That move?

Alexander Siddig: It woke me up, yeah it woke me up to being naïve and stupid and that real people get involved in these things.

So, Yeah, What’s The Deal With The Name Change?

Jordan Hoffman: It’s funny, for a while you were Siddig El Fadil, then you became Alexander Siddig.  But your full name, is. . .

Alexander Siddig: It’s a mouthful; it’s not something you’d say on the street.

Jordan Hoffman: What is it, could you actually say it for me?

Alexander Siddig: Siddig El Tahir El Fadil El Siddig Abderrahman Mohammed Ah – I stumble a bit myself – Ahmed Abdel Karim El Mahdi.

Jordan Hoffman: Wow, okay. And you sort of just picked Alexander?  Said Alexander works.

Alexander Siddig: Yeah, Alexander worked because it was, it’s Mesopotamian, it’s Arab, you know it’s pre-Muslim. The “Al” bit is a bit like, well, I suppose like Al-Qaeda.  Al-Isskandar is the actual name in Arabic. And it’s a pre – it’s not a Western name at all, it’s an Arabic name. Hence, obviously the great Mesopotamian Alexander who didn’t look much like Colin Farrell and all that jazz.

Jordan Hoffman: So it wasn’t just as random as everyone says.

Alexander Siddig: No, it wasn’t random, and, also my first best friend had a dog that was called Alex. And so I was already happy with that name.

Jordan Hoffman: Can we talk a little bit about your background more? You’re a descendant of Sudanese royalty? Is that correct?

Alexander Siddig: No. I mean, there are no royals in Sudan.  There are certainly religious leaders and I was – my family is a family called the Mahdi family, and these are direct descendants of 1880’s great religious leader. Mahdi loosely translated means messiah so you’ll kind of get the idea.

Jordan Hoffman: That’s a heavy burden!

Alexander Siddig: Heavy burden for him, not for me. I can be the naughty grandchild, great-great grandchild going off the rail. So yeah, the family ruled in the Sudan for many, many years. Even now Sadiq al-Mahdi is trying his hardest to get into power as an opposition party in Sudan.

Jordan Hoffman: You steer clear of the political side of what’s going on over there?

Alexander Siddig: I do, because I’m pretty disgusted by it to be honest. It horrifies me. I happen to have had the privilege of growing up in the West, dictating my righteous indignation across to Africa where they have a much more difficult time and more nuanced existence than I could possibly lead. But I find it very abhorrent and very dangerous. I have problems with the far right. . .I went back in the ’80s and it was a gap between presidencies when my family I weren’t going to be arrested when we arrived and they were extremely condescending . . . Fundamentalist Islam terrifies me anyway, speaking as an Arab. And that’s not just because I’ve been brought up in a coveted western society, it’s because it is scary. That’s the end of that.